Visible light communication (VLC) using light emitting diodes (LEDs) offers the potential for high data rate wireless communication. By some estimates, LEDs will dominate the lighting market of the future and as such will create the opportunity for enabling auxiliary downlink carriers for indoor wireless access.
In various known systems access to a building or rooms inside a building is based on authentication of a user, e.g., an employee, customer, or any individual who is authorized to access an area. Currently, most of the systems implement user authentication using RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology which requires that users carry RFID badges which are read by RFID reader devices at points of entry to certain areas of a building. The obvious drawback of this approach is the need to install reader terminals as well as requiring the users to carry dedicated RFID badges. Other drawbacks are RFID badge commissioning for new users/visitors and badge updates. Even more importantly, RFID has been shown to have security problems. It has been recently shown that the information embedded in passive NFC (Near Field Communication) and RFID tags can be covertly read by an Android phone emulating the behavior of an authentic reader device.
Thus it should be appreciated that RFID and NFC tag based authentication methods though easily available are not as secure as desired by many organizations which prefer highly secure building access. Based on the above discussion it should be appreciated that there is a need for new methods and apparatus that can be used to provide secure access to an area without requiring dedicated badge/tag reader devices to be installed. It would be desirable if such methods and apparatus could use of mobile communications devices such as smart phones that a typical user may carry thereby eliminating the need for a separate RFID (Radio Frequency Identifier) device such as a badge and/or some other additional gadget to be carried by the user.